Inspiring 9-year-old loses 66 pounds

The 10-year-old California girl went from 186 to 120 pounds in less than a year. With her parents cheering her on, Breanna dramatically changed her diet, hopped on the treadmill for over an hour and 15 minutes every day and joined swim and basketball teams.

A year ago, Breanna couldn’t imagine swimming laps or shooting hoops. At age 9, the girl from Clovis, Calif., was uncomfortably overweight. She was slow and sluggish and moving around was difficult because she couldn’t breathe easily. Kids teased her at school.

“Everybody at school would call me names,” Breanna of Clovis, Calif., told Good Morning America. “They would call me fatty, they would call me fat head.”

Breanna was chubby from the start and when she was a baby pediatricians told her parents, Heidi and Dan, “that she’d grow into her body.” By kindergarten, Breanna weighed 100 pounds. She became one of the millions of American kids struggling with obesity.

“After a while, we went and got other doctors’ opinions,” Heidi told Good Morning America. “We had her tested for everything from thyroid to diabetes – her endocrinology got tested – allergies, and everything came out fine so we knew at that point we had to step things up.”

And step up they did. Breanna went on a strict diet and exercise regime. “There was nothing that stopped us,” Heidi said. “We went at night, in the rain, in the hail, in the fog, nothing. We had a zero-tolerance policy. We’re doing the walk, no matter what.”

Breanna’s story made national news the same week a new report revealed that childhood obesity rates are slightly decreasing in a handful of cities. New York City saw a 5.5 percent decline, according to The New York Times, Philadelphia 5 percent and Los Angeles 3 percent in recent years. The decreases are small but, Dr. Thomas Farley, the health commissioner in New York City, told The New York Times, “It’s been nothing but bad news for 30 years, so the fact that we have any good news is a big story.”

For many years, American kids were only getting fatter and fatter, and Breanna’s story and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation are small signs that the trend could be starting to change.

Today, roughly 1 in 3 children (ages 2 to 19) are overweight. These children are all at an increased risk for developing such diseases as diabetes and hypertension.

But in recent years, state and city campaigns, education leaders, Michelle Obama and even the Sesame Street gang have fought hard to fight the obesity epidemic. Big sugary drinks and lazy days in front of the television have been widely deemed unhealthy. Could the efforts finally be starting to pay off?

Breanna Bond is just one girl who has demonstrated that kids can win the obesity battle—but hopefully more will follow in her tracks.

“She is an inspiration to the world and all children who are having weight issues across America, that you can do it with a pair of tennis shoes and motivation,” Heidi told Good Morning America.